Expository Text Descriptive
Produce a descriptive expository passage with topic sentence and supporting details.
Session summary (SOAP)
Stays on this screen. Nothing is saved or sent.
Mark a card Correct, Correct with cue or Incorrect and the summary writes itself here.
How to run it
Ask for the topic sentence on its own and check it before any details. A topic sentence that is itself a detail — rainforests get a lot of rain — will produce a paragraph with no organising idea, and it is much easier to fix before the details than after. Count the details out loud so three means three. Twelve minutes covers two or three prompts properly.
Cueing ladder
Start at the top. Add support one step at a time.
- IndependentPresent the item and wait 5 seconds of quiet before helping.Log as correct
- Question promptAsk a story-grammar question: who, where, what was the problem, what happened next?Log as cued
- Two choicesOffer two possible next parts of the story and let the student pick and say it.Log as cued
- ModelTell that part yourself; the student tells it back in their own words.Log as cued
Adjust it
Use fewer parts, and keep a first-next-last visual on the table.
Ask for the retell without the pictures, with a feeling or a reason added to each part.
Matching IEP goal
Given a picture or story prompt, Student will explain a topic with a main idea and supporting details in 4 of 5 opportunities across 3 consecutive sessions, given no more than one question prompt.
Send it home through the parent portal →About this activity
Ten prompts with the same structure: a topic sentence plus three supporting details, on a rainforest, your school, a thunderstorm, how a bee lives, the moon, a desert, a firefighter's job, the human heart, a volcano. The structure is the target rather than the content — a topic sentence that says what the paragraph is about, and three details that belong under it, is the shape of most school writing.
What to listen for
Listen for details that belong to the topic sentence. A student who opens with the rainforest is full of life and then describes the weather has drifted, which is the commonest structural fault in expository writing and is invisible unless you check it deliberately. Watch which topics produce the best paragraphs — the ones the student knows about — since a thin paragraph is often a knowledge gap rather than a language one.
Carrying it home
Ask for three things about something the student cares about, after a sentence that says what it is. Football, a game, a pet — the topic does not matter and the structure does.
What's in this activity
- Topic sentence + 3 details: Describe a rainforest.
- Topic sentence + 3 details: Describe your school.
- Topic sentence + 3 details: Describe a thunderstorm.
- Topic sentence + 3 details: Describe how a bee lives.
- Topic sentence + 3 details: Describe the moon.
- Topic sentence + 3 details: Describe your favorite sport.
- Topic sentence + 3 details: Describe a desert.
- Topic sentence + 3 details: Describe a firefighter's job.
- Topic sentence + 3 details: Describe the human heart.
- Topic sentence + 3 details: Describe a volcano.
Questions
- What grades is this for?
- Third through sixth, alongside classroom expectations for paragraph writing.
- Is it free?
- Yes, no account needed to use the prompts.
- Should this be spoken or written?
- Spoken first. The structure is easier to hear than to see, and a student who can say a topic sentence and three details can usually write one — the reverse is much less often true.
Use this board with your caseload
With a free account, every correct, cued and incorrect mark is saved to the student and scored against their IEP goal, with the data written up for you. Assign it as home practice through the parent portal.
Track progress freeFree for SLPs. No card, no trial clock.